Setback
by Chereche
Summary: Ben tries to counsel Mal through the consequences of her rash action.


She was embarrassed. It was the first thing Ben noticed when, in a show of his father's legendary strength, he spun both Mal and the three legged stool she was seated on around to face him. She squeaked in surprise, a rather adorable sound, he noted, before she looked up long enough to glare at him before dropping back her gaze to her lap. He observed her for a few minutes, taking in her stiff countenance, hunched shoulders, and the way she wrung her hands in her lap. She was the picture of embarrassment, he thought with fond exasperation, but that would not assist her in getting out of her current predicament.

They were in a room further down the corridor from the principal's office. It was a micro-apartment of sorts, it contained a bed, small bathroom and bath and a comfortable window seat. It was not meant for long term usage, but, Ben knew instinctively that if it was left up to Mal on her own, she would probably break the record for the room's tenancy, and since he had a surprise date planned for her the next day, he could not have that happening, now could he? The room also reeked of disuse. The sidekicks of course ensured that it was well dusted and the linen rotated ever so often, but there was still a slight staleness to the air that the breeze fluttering in from the windows had yet to fully remove. Ben wasn't one hundred percent certain, but he was pretty confident that Mal was the first occupant of the room in a good few years.

"Do you want to tell me what happened Mal?" he asked her bent head. "I was rather surprised to come back from the Council Meeting to find out that my girlfriend had been confined."

"Grounded you mean," she muttered, annoyance lacing her tone. "Let's not try to make it sound fancy Benny-boo."

He snorted at that, certain now of her mood. She only called him that when she was either trying to mock him or insult him.

"If you want to put it that way," he allowed, dropping a hand down onto her hair for a moment. "Come on now," he said coaxingly, running his fingers through it in a motion he hoped she found soothing, "talk to me Mal. What happened?"

"If you're here, you know."

"I want to hear it from you Mal," he told her. "Talk to me," he added, a bit more firmly now.

She huffed and shook her head in a move meant to displace his hand. "Chad insulted Evie. I spelled him. The end."

"You turned him into a tadpole, Mal."

"I'm not good enough yet to manage a toad," she said, and was that a pout he heard in her voice?

Shaking his head ruefully, Ben crouched down. If she would not look up at him, he would come down to her level.

She docked her head lower, her chin nearly touching her chest in an attempt to avoid him. He would have none of that. In a move he was quickly becoming accustomed to, he glided his fingers beneath her chin and carefully lifted her face so that she had no choice but to look at him. He tsked at what he saw - a combination of self-righteous indignation, anger, annoyance, and perhaps just the slightest hint of remorse.

"Hello there," he whispered.

"Don't patronise me," she snapped, her green eyes glaring at him.

He ignored the snark. It was a reflexive action more than anything else he knew. "So," he said conversationally, as if she had not spoken a word. "Fairy Godmother said that she may actually have to dig out her wand if Chad doesn't change back by morning."

"He'll stay that way forever," she declared hotly.

"You don't mean that," Ben rebutted, tapping her cheek with a finger. "You're just angry."

"Well you don't know what he told Evie," she told him, "he deserved it and more. He's lucky I didn't throw him at the nearest bird."

"Mal," Ben said, "what happened to being good?"

"What happened to you Auradon people being pillars of virtue? Chad's a sleaze ball."

Ben shrugged. "I think," he said carefully, "that I told you this before. We are not our parents. We choose who we want to be. Yes Chad is Auradon born and raised, but if he chooses not to be fully virtuous..."

"He can choose not to be," she finished softly.

"Good girl," he praised, taking and kissing her hand softly in reward.

"I chose to spell him," Mal continued, "which means I chose not to do the right thing. I'll be stuck here forever," she moaned.

Ben laughed at that, thoroughly amused. "Not forever sweetheart. I think that's why Fairy Godmother allowed me to come. Hopefully we can have you unstuck before the day is done. I just need to ensure that you really have learnt your lesson."

"I'm not a child," Mal grumbled, instinctively trying and failing to shift on the stool. "And I thought magic was banned. Why does she have this thing?"

'This thing' as Mal referred to it, was a magically enchanted stool that, once upon a time, belonged to a villain long since forgotten. It truly was a devious invention, he allowed. A person made to sit on it would be stuck until the stool's owner decided to free them. Legend had it that many had died seated upon it. Fairy Godmother, upon locating it years before, had been unable to destroy it. She was though, strong enough magically to alter the components of its enchantments. Afterwards she had lodged it at the newly opened school, using it as a method of correction for wayward students.

"Everyone needs correction sometimes Mal," he told her. "Mother still has an enchanted newspaper that follows my dad. It whacks him whenever he's being too...beastly."

A smile lit up on his face when she chuckled despite herself at the implications of it.

"It's embarrassing Ben," she admitted, looking at him. "I'm stuck on a stool in the corner."

"Your actions put you here," he pointed out. "Therefore, you need to get yourself out of this situation."

"I'm not going to apologise to a tadpole," she declared. "I told you, he deserves it."

"I'm not disagreeing with you, Mal," he said carefully. "I agree that Chad stepped way out of line. But should you have spelled him?"

"He needed to be punished!"

"By you?"

"Who else would have done it?" she asked, and, Ben was shocked to note that she there was honest confusion in her voice. She seriously believed that there had been no other option. What had her own school been like, he wondered.

"You could have gone to any of the teachers, Mal, or directly to the principal. Or you could have told me about it when I came back and I would have sorted things out for you."

"Why would I have gone to them? What good would that have done?"

"Do you think that you wouldn't have been believed?"

"We got to sort out our own problems," she told him. "Involving other people would just be...weak."

"Is that how it was for you?" he questioned softly.

"That's how it always is," she answered, looking at him as if he was particularly stupid. "You gotta handle things on your own or with your allies. Otherwise, you're just weak. Chad insulted Evie. I took care of it."

"But you didn't have to," he told her patiently. "Any of those people I listed would have helped you, because you deserve to be helped. You don't have to do this alone Mal, and you don't have to curse people to teach them a lesson. There are better ways. If you had gone to the staff Chad would have been given detention or a demerit. He wouldn't have gotten away with it."

"I don't believe you."

Ben eyes softened at her words. She wasn't being obstinate; she genuinely could not conceptualise what he was saying.

"I promised you I would teach you about love, didn't I?" he asked.

She looked at him, confused by the change of topic. She nodded regardless.

"Then maybe you can trust me enough about this? Let me teach you that you don't need to take everything on yourself. You, Carlos, Jay and Evie always work together, yes?"

"Now we do," she agreed.

"And things are easier for you?" he asked.

"Yeah. It's...nice having a group. That's why I defended her."

"I know," he said reassuringly. "What I need you to try to see is that the entire school can be seen as a group in the same way. The staff and, well, most of the students have your best interests at heart Mal. In the same way you defended Evie, people will defend you. _I_ will defend you. But you need to give us a chance to. You can't just go around cursing people, okay?"

"Cursing people is wrong," she said after a long moment of contemplation. "I did a bad thing. I-I can't be good, can't I? I was trying to defend Evie, but I ended up doing a bad thing. I'm no good at being good," she finished sadly.

"Hey, hey, hey," none of that, he protested, lifting her chin back up so he could see into her eyes. "You're not bad Mal. You're not evil. I told you that, didn't I? You just did a bad thing, but your intentions were good. We just need to get you to a position where when you want to help someone, your first instinct is to do something good."

"I'm not sure I can."

"I'll show you how, Mal," he assured her. "I'm here for you - I'll always be here for you and I will help you become the best person you can be. You just have to give me a chance to show you how good I can be."

Mal didn't answer, instead nipping her lip for a moment. "I lied to you."

"What?"

She looked away, twisting her mouth. "I lied to you. I know how to break the curse on Chad. It's not hard to."

"Good girl," he praised, taking and squeezing her hand. "So you'll remove the curse?"

"I will," she agreed, "but I'm not going to apologise to him!"

"One thing at a time," he agreed, knowing better than to push his luck.

"I don't want to disappoint you Ben," she told him then, and Ben knew enough to read between the lines and realise that that was a backhanded apology to him for getting herself into trouble in the first place.

"You never could," he reassured her, kissing her hand again. "Hey, what do you say we go see the principal now? She has Chad in her office so you can change him back there."

"I'm still stuck here Ben," she said with a trace of annoyance.

Ben laughed, straightening and holding out a hand to her. "You didn't notice did you? The chair released you the moment you acknowledged that your actions were wrong."

"Wh-what?" she gasped, her eyes widening when he gave a sharp tug and she rose up off the stool and into his arms. "I'm free."

"That you are, Mal," he agreed, hugging her close. "You're a good girl; the chair had no choice but to release you."

She burrowed into his chest for a moment, relishing in his presence around her before pulling back. "I'll try harder," she promised. "I will do better."

He smiled, and impulsively kissed her brow. "I know you will Mal."


End file.
